


An Annual Tradition

by kaeorin



Series: Loki's Lullabies [61]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avenger Loki (Marvel), Avenger Reader (Marvel), Birthday, Birthday Fluff, Birthday Presents, F/M, POV Loki (Marvel), Pre-Relationship, Reader-Insert, Walks In The Park
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:08:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24381070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaeorin/pseuds/kaeorin
Summary: You’re hiding something, but Loki is very good at reading you. (It's another birthday fic even though I wrote one last month; I really hope you don't mind!)
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/Reader
Series: Loki's Lullabies [61]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1678240
Comments: 13
Kudos: 202





	An Annual Tradition

You were hiding something.

Loki had to admit: you were rather good at it. The others didn’t seem to notice. Perhaps the only reason he noticed was that he spent entirely too much time watching you. You smiled like normal, with every bit of the happiness that usually shone in your eyes, but when you thought no one was looking, he saw how a wistfulness crept in. 

It started in the morning. He heard you puttering around in the kitchen. That wasn’t uncommon, really. When you made breakfast, he found it hard to resist lurking in the hallway outside the door. You hummed when you thought you were alone. Sometimes you sang silly little songs to yourself, mostly about whatever it was that you were doing at any given moment. He’d stopped trying to keep himself from smiling at your antics. Realistically, he knew that if he truly didn’t want to let you make him smile, all he had to do was stop lurking. But, all things considered, it was just easier to let you make him smile.

This morning was no different. You started out sleepy, moving slowly and yawning more than humming. By the time the aroma of coffee filled the room, you’d apparently woken up enough to be more like yourself. You ignore the coffee pot in favor of whatever it was that you were working on. You were making pancakes. Loki wasn’t really a fan of the odd mushy texture of them, but he found that he really liked to watch you work. So he did.

You’d been cooking for a while before the rest of the team started to filter in. Loki heard Rogers and Barnes step out of the elevators and make their way into the kitchen. They must have been getting back from their morning run. He ducked out of sight until they were well past, and had to work hard to push down the quick rush of jealous that surged in him as Rogers leaned down to kiss your cheek. Barnes filled three mugs with coffee and set the third in front of you with a quiet smile. For as storied a history as Barnes had, he didn’t seem to have any trouble letting himself be soft with you. Loki couldn’t see your face, but he imagined the smile you would surely have thanked him with, imagined the way you’d look shyly up at him from beneath your eyelashes. You looked at _him_ like that, at Loki, and you did it often enough that he’d started to think of that as _his_ look.

Loki continued to hang back until nearly everyone else had filled the table. Thor clasped him on the shoulder on his way in and, in a surprisingly quiet voice, told Loki that he didn’t need to hesitate in doorways like that. No one overheard. Thankfully. Thor dragged him to the table and beamed at you when you placed a large stack of pancakes in front of him. 

You paused for a moment then, surely remembering the other times that Loki had tried unsuccessfully to eat the other pancakes that you had offered him. After a moment, he heard you moving behind him, and then you placed a plate before him.

“I don’t...I put chocolate chips in these?” He hated how worried you sounded when you spoke to him. “And instead of syrup, I thought you might like them better if you tried jam?” A small pot of raspberry jam appeared before him and he had to fight _hard_ to keep from reaching out to take your hand. “But it’s okay if you still don’t like them. I won’t be upset.”

You didn’t seem to notice the way the rest of the team was looking at the two of you. Most of them looked taken aback, but Loki caught the way Barton’s lips curled into a wily smirk. 

“How come _he_ gets chocolate chips and the rest of us don’t?” Even though Loki could hear the teasing note in Barton’s voice, he still didn’t like the way he was speaking to you. He drew in a breath to try to step in and say something, but he heard you laugh behind him.

“Because he doesn’t like plain ones, but the rest of you _inhale_ them.” Your tone offered no room for argument, but he was sure that you were smiling. Maybe your arms were crossed, or on your hips as you planted your feet solidly against the ground to offer a more imposing figure. He felt a little guilty, then, at thinking that you needed him to stand up for you. Time and time again, you’d proven your own strength on this team. You settled into your seat across from him and flashed Loki a quick smile. “And because I only had only enough chocolate chips left for two. I think _someone’s_ been mixing them into his popcorn again.”

Barton kept his face carefully blank, like he hadn’t heard a word you’d said, and then tore into his pancakes. Conversation carried on around the two of you like it sometimes did. He watched you smear a bit of jam onto your pancakes, and found himself following suit. Maybe it was the syrup he didn’t like, and the way it soaked into the little cakes. You gave him another shy smile and raised your fork in a tiny _cheers_ gesture.

This was better. The jam was sweet, but in an entirely different way. It offered a refreshing contrast to the sweetness of the cakes. It was cool and crisp and paired rather well with the chocolate chips you’d added. He said nothing, like always—he preferred to leave conversation here to the others—but he caught the pride that flashed in your eyes when you saw that he’d finished his stack. You took in the sight of the whole table, and your smile grew a little wider. That was something new, or at least he hadn’t noticed it before. But he liked the way you smiled.

Everyone went about their business. Things were peaceful. There were no missions, so the Tower was rather uncomfortably full of Avengers, but they all more or less took care of their own things. There was still enough for everyone to do that restlessness had not yet begun to creep in. 

He crossed paths with you again a little later in the afternoon. You had curled yourself into one corner of the couch, and he could tell from the way you sat that you were looking at your phone. Even from the doorway he could see how your brow was creased, how your lips were frozen in a half-smile that did not meet your eyes. It was clear that something was wrong, but as soon as he cleared his throat to get your attention, he watched that look slide off of your face, replaced instead by—what else?—a cheerful smile.

“Hiya,” you said. Even when he broke in on your time alone like this, you always sounded happy when you greeted him. “Everything okay?”

He wanted to ask you the same thing, but the absolute ease with which you hid whatever was going on in your mind stilled his tongue. He crept inside and sat in a chair near you, but not so close that he’d risk making you uncomfortable. “Thank you. For breakfast.” The awkwardness he felt around you confounded him. You were Midgardian. You were mortal. You should not have any kind of effect on him whatsoever, let alone the effect that made his stomach feel like it was doing flips.

“Of course!” As always, you sounded like you meant what you were saying. He wanted to say more. He wanted to tell you what it meant to him that you’d noticed the way he rarely finished the other pancakes you’d made, but the words wouldn’t come. He let the silence stretch between you for entirely too long, but then gestured towards your phone.

“What news of the outside world?” He sat forward a bit, trying to catch your eyes. It had not escaped his notice, the last time the team gathered for a movie, how utterly enchanted you had been. “Tell me everything.”

Sure enough, recognition flashed in your eyes and you grinned at him. You paused for a moment, perhaps remembering, and then answered: “Everything? You are far too eager and curious for a Hobbit. Most unnatural.”

He felt himself smiling back at you. “Curiosity is in a prince’s nature, my lady. It is a very good thing indeed that I have abilities that your Hobbits do not.” He took a moment to think. It was all a lie, of course, but he told himself that it was okay. You were still grinning at him, your eyes sparkling with mischief just as he expected his own did. You’d recognize the lie, surely. “If you will not speak to me of it, I have only to peer inside your mind.” He waggled his eyebrows at you.

Rather than playing along, though, he watched as you tilted your head curiously at him. Before he could become irritated at himself for having spoiled the game, you sighed and looked back at your phone. “It’s nothing. Just...today’s my birthday and normally my sister would have called or texted me by now, but she hasn’t.”

He was familiar with birthdays. People rarely bothered with them in Asgard, but, as mortals had so many fewer, he knew that you tended to celebrate them with thunderous applause. Stark threw himself giant parties each year, filling the Tower with music and alcohol and women in lovely tight dresses. Sometimes there were birthdays in the films that you all watched together. Loki had become very familiar with the pointy hats and the balloons and streamers and songs. If nothing else, he knew that loved ones tended to heap love and kindness upon the subject of a birthday, but no one had said a word at breakfast. It was his turn to tilt his head at you.

Maybe _you_ were the one with the power to read minds. Before he could draw a breath, you shrugged. “I don’t make a big deal out of it. It’s silly when you’re an adult. Unless you’re Tony.”

“Well, even then...” 

He liked the way you laughed, short and soft and sweet. You took another look at your phone and then turned it face-down onto the cushion beside you.

“It is customary, I believe, for a birthday to be accompanied by presents.” Maybe he sort of liked the idea of that. Growing up, he’d never wanted for anything material, but it seemed like a nice idea, receiving something special for no real reason except tradition and the fact that you were loved. “So what would you like?”

Gods, how he wanted to caress your cheek when you smiled at him like that. You raised your eyebrows at him. “I wanted chocolate chip pancakes,” you said simply. “And I got them.”

No. Absolutely not. He sat farther forward in his seat. “No, even _I_ know that birthday presents are meant to come from someone other than yourself. Name it, love.” The endearment slipped out by accident, but he forced himself not to give himself away. You didn’t seem overly surprised by it, anyway. “A prince of Asgard is offering you a blank check. Only a fool would turn this down.” He didn’t have money here in Midgard, but he was only just realizing that there was precious little he wouldn’t do for you if you so much as asked. 

You chewed your lower lip thoughtfully. “Is it too— Could...” You fidgeted nervously, and he’d be damned if he didn’t want to still your nervous hands with his own. “Might I request the honor of my lord’s company on a stroll through the city?”

It was impossible to miss the way you tried to turn your request into a joke with the silly formalities, but when he realized exactly what you were asking, his heart thudded in his chest. You wanted him to walk with you. That was _it_? Of course he’d never really had you pegged as one for riches or jewelry, but simply _him_? He made himself sit up a bit straighter, instead of leaping immediately to his feet, and nodded at you.

“The honor would be mine, my gentle lady. Shall we depart now?”

And you did. The skies were bright, warm, but it was not yet quite so late in the year that they were suffocating. You brought him through the city. It became clear that you walked a lot—you pointed out parts of neighborhoods that he might not have noticed otherwise. He loved the sun on your face, your hair. Like a flower, you truly came to life there in the fresh air. You were distracting enough in the Tower, but out here on the streets, you were...radiant. 

He listened to you talk. At times, you put him in mind of a bird, chattering happily there in the sunlight, but he drank in every last word. In the Tower, you could be so quiet that it made him nervous. Maybe you didn’t like him, or didn’t care to try for conversation, or simply had nothing to say, but as he listened, he got to know a bit more of the inside of your mind. You were bright and thoughtful. It was as though you’d been holding back only for his sake, and now that he’d agreed to the simple gift of his time, you felt free. 

With each block, he found himself falling ever more hopelessly under your spell. It was a damn good thing that you worked on the same side. By the time you stopped in a park, he was starting to believe that he would turn his back on everyone if you only asked. You sat on a bench under the shade of a tree and he was only too happy to join you. 

“I love this city,” you sighed happily. Loki was a little preoccupied with the way your hand rested between the two of you, against the slat of wood. It would be so easy to move his hand, only a little, and finally take yours. Just as he was gathering the courage, you turned your head to look at him. He felt a little like he’d been caught in something, but you only smiled. “Thank you for coming with me. I can’t tell you how much it means to me. It’s...a lot.”

Maybe his plans shifted a bit in that moment. It was the sunlight, maybe, or the warm breeze around you. Without truly thinking about it, he lifted his hand to touch your cheek. You were every bit as soft as he’d imagined you’d be. You did not pull away. Thus emboldened, he brushed his thumb along your cheekbone. He watched your pupils dilate, saw the way you drew your lip between your teeth once more. 

“You can’t really read minds, can you?” It was barely a whisper, but he heard each word as perfectly as if you were breathing them into his ear. He tried to smile, and to ignore the way your breath was coming ever-so-slightly quicker in your chest. When he didn’t answer, you stuck your chin out a bit, careful not to knock his hand away from you. “Can you read my mind right now?”

He felt a crooked smile sneak across his face. Perhaps it was just his imagination, but he could swear that he felt a heat rise into your cheeks. Lovely thing. He studied your lips for a moment before looking up again to meet your gaze. “Oh, love. I hope so.”

It was hard to know exactly who had taken the first step, but then his lips were on yours.


End file.
